Martha

Text: Luke 10:38-42, John 11:17-27, 38-40

Personally, I think Martha gets a bad rap. Perhaps it is the Type A, go-getter in me jumping to her defense, but the world needs Marthas. I love to rest and soak in the moment as much as the next gal, but sometimes we need those folks who get stuff done, am I right?

We know Martha as the “doer” in this familiar passage from Luke 10. She opens her home and offers what she has to the Lord. She lets her sister Mary know, via a conversation with Jesus, what she expects of her. It doesn’t seem she’s being completely unreasonable either, at least not from what we see in Scripture. She isn’t walking around bitter and hostile, slamming pots and pans, rolling eyes and sighing loudly—behaving as a victim of her own standards and demanding everyone in earshot do the same. Not that I know anything about that. Ahem.

Martha insists on making Jesus’ visit a good one. And when her expectations aren’t being met, she makes it known by taking her complaint straight to the guest of honor. Let’s listen in on their conversation:

But Martha was distracted by her many tasks, and she came up and asked, “Lord, don’t You care that my sister has left me to serve alone? So tell her to give me a hand.”

The Lord answered her, “Martha, Martha, you are worried and upset about many things, but one thing is necessary. Mary has made the right choice, and it will not be taken away from her.”

(Luke 10:40-42 HCSB, emphasis added)

It’s clear Martha has a servant’s heart (we’ll see her serving again in John 12:2). We can hear the unspoken longing behind her plea to Jesus in her home that day—she just wanted to serve her Master and serve Him well. Well-intended “doing” is good, but not when it distracts us from what is best.

When the Messiah is sitting in your living room, the dirty dishes can wait.

Jesus didn’t come to Martha’s house to eat. He’s the Son of God, after all. As we see from the story of the loaves and fishes (Luke 9), He knows how to get some food if He wants some. Jesus came to give the one thing both Mary and Martha needed—He came to give them Himself.

In John 11, we see the two sisters in a very different circumstance—their brother, Lazarus, has died. Mary and Martha send word to Jesus about their brother’s death, and while Mary and the others stay in the house mourning, our “doer” runs out to meet Jesus (John 11:20). Here’s what happens next:

Then Martha said to Jesus, “Lord, if You had been here, my brother wouldn’t have died. Yet even now I know that whatever You ask from God, God will give You.”

“Your brother will rise again,” Jesus told her.

Martha said, “I know that he will rise again in the resurrection at the last day.”

Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in Me, even if he dies, will live.

(John 11:21-25 HCSB, emphasis added)

Once again, Jesus teaches Martha a subtle but crucial distinction: He doesn’t just have the power to give new life, He Himself IS new life.

His presence is the one necessary thing.

We are all Marthas and Marys, struggling to know when to sit and when to run, when to “do” and when to “be.” But the one necessary thing remains—the life-saving, heart-changing presence of Jesus.

Wherever we are today, may we find ourselves there with Him.

SHE READS TRUTH/Women In The Word